Saturday, September 26, 2015

I first read this book shortly after it came out in 1981,
and I loved it. I've never forgotten it, have loaned my copy out, and replaced
it, at least 4 times. I recently bought the New Edition, which contains
additional information, and am so glad I did.

In rereading the book, I realized I had remembered certain
scenes accurately – and some that didn't exist at all ;-).

Lalu Nathoy/Polly Bemis was a real woman who was sold by her
father to bandits, smuggled into the US and, as the slave she was, found her
way from San Francisco to Portland to Warrens, Idaho where her owner used her
in his saloon as a 'bar girl' and where she became known as Polly.

Little is known of her life in China, and McCunn does a
marvelous job of conveying the 'what might have happened.' Girls had little to
no value in China, except to marry into a higher level of society if at all
possible, thereby bringing some monetary relief to her family. To this end,
many first born girls of even peasant families, had their feet bound. Lalu's
feet were bound, and then unbound when she was needed to work in the fields to
help her father. Although her feet never returned to 'normal' she was able to
walk long distances and do field work on them.

Bandits came to her village, and she was stolen. The leader
gave her father two bags of seed, thereby changing it from a theft to a sale.
Lalu began her journey to probably Shanghai where she was smuggled aboard a ship
bound to San Francisco. From there, she went north until eventually reaching
Warrens, Idaho, as the slave of Hong King. There is a myth about gaining her
freedom, the truth as we know it is that no one knows how she ended up free. We
do know she married her benefactor, Charlie Bemis, and lived many years in the
Salmon River area.

I think McCunn did a tremendous job showing the cultures of
China and pioneer Idaho in this book. Yes, there were areas I would have liked
to see expanded, and undoubtedly as you read it, there will be areas you wish
were in more depth, but over all, this is a fascinating, and accessible story.
I highly recommend it for anyone with an interest in our history, or the
history of the Chinese in our country. Although it is an adult book, it is
suitable for those in Junior High School.

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

I think the title is somewhat misleading, it wasn't just
good old Genghis who changed the world, but his sons and grandsons. And change it
they did, without a doubt. Did they change it as much as stated in this book? I
don't know. I also don't know enough to put forth an intelligent argument for
or against.

What I do think is this should have been written as two
books, Volume I on Genghis (who dies fairly early in this book) and Volume II
on the rest of the crowd. I have read a few books on Genghis, and while this
book does bring to light some heretofore-unknown tidbits, it doesn't tell
nearly as much as I'd hoped, especially from Weatherford. I've also read a
couple of books about Kublai, and again, this book seemed to gloss over some
fascinating areas. Two books, each in the 400-500 page range would have been a
treat most rare.

I won't get into the "who invented noodles first"
– Mongols or Europeans argument? From what I've read just about all
agricultural communities that grew wheat or a similar grain, came up with a
form of noodles. And also, from what I've read, the Mongols had a real
antipathy toward blood and raw meat, and I can't help but wonder about them
placing meat between them and their horses to tenderize it. Between the horse
and the saddle would seem to be a. unbalancing, and b. too iffy to rub sores on
the horse. I believe they did put milk in bags tied to their saddles to beat it
into butter or yogurt, or at least fermenting it. I can picture them doing the
same with the meat to tenderize it, but cooking it later.

I absolutely loved the parts where Weatherford talked about
having been there, seeing the places, being with the locals who explained
various things to him, such as why horses would go in this direction, how to
tell if the ice is thick enough to ride across, etc. I also appreciated the
maps. Really appreciated the maps!

All in all, if you're interested in Genghis Khan, read this
book. But don't stop when you put the book down. Try some of John Man's books;
he, too, has been there. This book is easily read, it is not a textbook, it is
very accessible to the average person, and the history buff will, I'm sure,
enjoy it. I did. There are several excellent books out there about Genghis, and
this is a good one.

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

The Mountain Men were my childhood heroes. While other girls
dreamed of princes and castles and unicorns or horses, I dreamed of living in
the forest, trapping beaver, evading unfriendly Indians (though I was sure I'd
be welcome by all). While my friends took riding lessons, I roamed the woods. I
dreamed of being John Colter, Hugh Glass, or Sacagawea (at that time, I had no
idea Marie Dorion even existed).

Now that I've reached an age where wandering the woods, and
living in childhood dreams, are not practical, I do my dreaming in history
books. Because I grew up in Portland, Oregon, and spent a great deal of time in
the Oregon Historical Society Museum, it is only natural that I have an
affinity toward books about the opening of The Oregon Country.

The Perilous West: Seven Amazing Explorers and the Founding
of the Oregon Trail by Larry E. Morris tells the stories of Ramsay Crooks,
Robert McClellan, John Hoback, Jacob Reszner, Edward Robinson, Pierre Dorion,
and Marie Dorion. Although the book focuses on these seven people, it is also
about the journey of the Wilson Price Hunt expedition or as they were known,
the Astorians as they traveled from St. Louis, Missouri to Astoria, Oregon.

The narrative does not stop with the arrival at Astoria, but
continues on until the stories of the seven are told, with many other stories
woven into the fabric of their lives to bring life and color to those seven.
Those people were a hardy lot. And their stories are of courage beyond
imagining.

While this book was, I am fairly certain, written for the
academic, it is also easily accessible to the casual reader, or history buff.
It offers an excellent opportunity to read about the opening of the West after
the time of Lewis and Clark, the perils these people faced, and overcame.
Usually overcame.

I would have liked to have maps scattered throughout the
book. I am fairly conversant in the geography of the areas he wrote about, but
maps would have been helpful. Just simple line drawings. And I would have loved
to have found footnotes instead of endnotes. Put the bibliography in endnotes,
but the interesting facts in footnotes.

I have not read any of his other books. Fortunately, that
situation is easily corrected. I highly recommend this book for anyone with an
interest in the Oregon Country. If his other books are as well researched as
this one, and as well written, and I see no reason to think otherwise, they
will be well worth my time and money.

Monday, September 7, 2015

I read fiction for one reason – to escape my own reality,
and this book certainly took me out of my reality into one of space travel,
multiverses, and obsession. It is a different take on the boy meets girl, boy
falls in love, girl leaves type of story.

Jack survives the upheavals, works for a new lord, sees the
lord's daughter, Rachel, and falls in love. He quite literally stalks her. She
notices, and one night seduces him. His fantasies and dreams take flight—he's
in love, and he's sure she's in love with him. Puppy love at its best. They
will marry, have a family, he will inherit from her father, and all is well in
his world until the next day when he's fired for no apparent reason and not
allowed on the property again.

The book opens on a space ship, just before landing on a new
planet to be colonized, and one is led to believe this will be a rollicking
space opera. Soon, we realize our hero is not. After a year or so on this bleak
planet, and dreams he can't quite understand, Jack and a few others return to
Earth. Jack goes to the place where all his memories are stored, retrieves them,
and goes to his palatial home, modeled after Hatshepsut's mausoleum. He
discovers he is wealthy beyond measure (no more young serf is he), and that he
longs to find his one, only, true love—Rachel.

With help from his multi friend (an alien from the multiverse),
Jack learns to travel both mentally, and physically, looking for his true love,
for surely, there is another Rachel, somewhere, that he can love and be loved
by, if only he can find her. Nothing will get in the way of his obsession or
its hoped-for conclusion. Not when he meets Rachel as she is, and she has no
memory of him, none at all and he doesn't like the woman she became; not when
he goes back in time and discovers the reason of his firing; nothing, not even
death will stop his search.

This book is well-written, and an excellent, well-crafted
story. For me, it became a tad tedious during the second half, hence 4 stars
not 5. I wanted Jack to grow up (after all, he was 700 years old by then), put
his big boy boxers on and get a life. But that would have been my story, not
Jack's. And Jack suffers the worst of all possible ailments. He is obsessed,
obsessed by a love that never existed.

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

This book was a gift, by a person who knew I loved poetry,
but had no idea about my passion for poetry in two languages! I keep hoping
someday I will learn a second language, and how better than by reading poetry?
How better than by reading Hablando A La Vez?? English on the left, Spanish on the right.

I don't know which is my favorite poem, but I keep going
back to A Poem for Lorca. All of these poems speak to me, some just a little
more insistently than others.

There are poems about the town of Caguas, where the author
was raised, Sundays with her father at the racetrack, and poems trying to
explain the word 'heritage' to her daughter.

There is love in these poems, there is loss, there is grief,
and there are smiles. Some of the poems reminded me of one of my favorite
writers, John Phillip Santos. The whole book is honest and strong. This is a
book I will keep on my poetry shelf, and read often. Then, again, I may keep it
by my bed where I can reach it on those nights I can't sleep and wish to talk
with a friend.